Everyone else could be the enemy. Or they could be working for the enemy. Or they could be under the influence of the enemy. Or they could just not like you.
— Rule Number 4 from Rules for a Successful Life as an Undercover Secret Agent
We practiced in my room, Victoria holding the flashlight under her chin so that her face was properly lit while I filmed on her cell phone. She must have done her signature gasp and shocked expression ten times until she said it looked real enough on camera. “This isn’t your first time making this type of thing?” I asked.
“Nope.” Victoria grinned. “I told you. I know what I’m doing.”
“You broke into museums in Nome?”
“There’s only one museum in Nome, with exhibits about the gold rush and how Siberian huskies were bred as sled dogs,” she said. “I gotta say, it was a lot more interesting than spoons.”
I thought about mentioning how we might have the soup spoon of the pirate Jean Lafitte, but Victoria was right. Huskies were more interesting than spoons. “So where did you illegally enter?”
“Someplace even more boring than your spoon museum, if you can believe it — school.” She shook her head and her ponytail swung from side to side. “That stupid school never proved a thing. Mom was sure I was the poor victim, bullied into it by those terrible middle-school boys and girls.”
“What happened?”
“It was August — summer was almost over. My friends and I were just hanging out in the apartment building. Mom and Dad were busy doing whatever it is they do,” Victoria said. “I don’t remember who showed us the Exploring Locked Places website, but I knew if I got picked that it could be my way out of Nome.”
“So?”
“We got a reply the next day. But the Exploring Locked Places guys said hiding until night in a school bathroom was boring. Everyone does it. And destroying the desks and books was actually criminal, so they would never air the clip. Mom didn’t want me to start the school year with the rumors that I was a juvenile delinquent.”
Start the school year? A sinking sensation grabbed hold of me. “When did you guys leave Alaska?”
“Whenever Mom said.” Victoria looked down quickly and tapped her smartphone. There it was, a video of me removing the sunflower picture from Principal Baker’s wall. The fire alarm shrieked in the background. She clicked it off. “Now, back to our plan for this evening. Can you get us into the museum without setting off the alarm?”
All I could think of was how this might be a trap. What if Victoria was a double agent, pretending to befriend me in order to help her parents get into the museum?
A muffled ring-ring interrupted my thoughts.
Victoria raised one eyebrow in question. “Where’s that ringing coming from?”
The clock read 7:02.
I pounced on my alarm clock and acted as if I was fumbling with the buttons. “I must have messed up the a.m. and p.m. switches,” I lied, returning her quizzical raised eyebrow with one of my own. I guess that genetic quirk was something else we had in common. The ringing stopped. But I knew that it would start again soon, and my lie about the alarm clock would not hold up if Victoria stayed in the room.
“Make sure your parents are busy. I know how to get into the Spoon. We’ll sneak out in ten minutes.”
“You’re sure you can get us in without setting off the alarm?”
“Yes.”
“You have the key?”
“No.”
“You know the code?” Victoria looked impressed.
“No. No. Just go.”
“Nine minutes, Moppet,” she said, walking out of the room. “Don’t be late.”
As soon as I heard her feet on the steps, I yanked An Abridged History of the United States off the shelf and opened it to the hiding spot. The shrill ringer pierced the air. Since I had to wait the usual number of rings, I held the phone under my pillow to muffle the sound. When the phone had gone through the normal cycle of ring-ring, silence, ring-ring, I opened it. “Tweedledee.”
“Tweedledum,” Roy’s deep voice answered. “Sunflower, we’ve got good news and bad news.”
“How bad?” I whispered into the phone.
“Your Uhms are not in Vietnam.”
I breathed in slowly. “Where are they?”
“Good news. Paraguay.”
“Impossible.” The sunflower cipher was all wrong. Either Mom misled me or something had happened to them.
“We know.” Roy’s voice was calm, probably due to years of training. “However, a set of their passports has been tracked there.”
“So, the Agency did, in fact, lose them?”
“No.” Roy cleared his throat. “We just weren’t informed of their movements beforehand.”
“You’re searching for them?”
“Of course, Sunflower.” Roy whispered something I couldn’t make out. “The Agency is on full alert. Once there is a positive, in-country sighting, we are positioned to take appropriate action.”
I didn’t like the way that sounded. “By action, what do you mean?”
“Don’t worry, Sunflower. Allow the professionals to do their jobs.”
Sure, but where the heck were the professionals when I was being blackmailed in my own home?
“Sunflower, whatever happens, do not let your uncle or aunt into the museum.”
“Sooner or later, I’ll have to open it for visitors.” Keeping the Spoon operating on its normal hours was protocol. An idea hit me. “Unless you want to share with me exactly why I should not?”
“No can do.” Roy’s shaky voice betrayed his anxiety. I had never heard him nervous before. “This is a direct order from the highest link in the command chain. You must obey.”
“Roy,” I pleaded. “Things are not good here. I have to do something. Starfish has been moved to a jail three hours away. I am alone.”
“I know, Sunflower.” Roy lowered his voice. “I’m trying to convince the higher-ups to send you backup.”
“Like the Cleaners that put the alarm on the museum?”
“No agents have been assigned to Silverton.”
“Who is PNW Security, then?”
Roy ignored my question. “I’m trying to get you extracted from the situation before it spirals out of control.”
“It already has.”
A good spy did her preparation (Rule Number 35). I needed to see for myself what was so important in the Spoon. “What if I let someone into the museum or went in myself?”
“The consequences will have a far-reaching impact.”
“Can you be more specific?” Dad had drawn a sketch of the museum. Why hide it?
“You have to trust us and obey the command.” He hung up and I was left alone to live with my choices. I grabbed some of my not-secret spy gear from the bookshelf. It seemed I wasn’t the most trusting or obedient kid in the world.